On the "Home" page of the current draft there's also a video of me playing, and by the deadline I plan to either keep that video there or upload a different one that I would have to create in the near future.
Musical talent is not like a birthmark
In addition to gradually getting my website together, the work I've been doing with the private music instruction has continued steadily. I have a total of eight students, and I recently lost two but then gained two more, keeping the number at eight. I have to say the money is nice, but what I really want to touch on is this concept of "talent". I find it intriguing that so many people use the word "talent" as if it's something that "you're either born with or you're not." To some extent, I actually disagree with this, and this is what the "Talent vs. Training" part of the blog title is about. You're not necessarily simply "born" with a talent the same way that someone is born double-jointed or born with Type O blood.
Almost all of the students I've had are children, with the exception of a guy I had who is in his 40's and an 18 year-old, so most of my discussions about scheduling and/or money issues are with the parents. One of the moms called me recently and said she wants her son to take a break from lessons because learning the piano just "isn't for him." I won't get into this conversation too much but I wanted to bring this up because I hear this from people all the time. I hear different variations of this excuse, too. Here are some of the others:
"Music is just not for me."
"It's not in my blood."
"I have no talent for music."
"I could never play like that."
"I've just never been musically inclined."
"Nobody in my family is musical, so obviously I don't have it."
"It's not in my genes."
"The only instrument I play is the volume knob on my stereo."
"I tried taking piano lessons once, it was just not for me."
"I tried taking lessons once but after two weeks I got bored/frustrated."
"I wish I could be one of those people who had musical talent."
I'm going to be very clear: I think that, most of the time, these excuses are total cop-outs. Yes, some people may have more of a "knack" for playing an instrument than others (i.e., maybe they have a slightly better ear for music than others, or their fingers might be slightly more coordinated, etc.) but I think this plays a much smaller role in a person's musical success. I think that the vast majority of a person's musical success is not so much because of their "knack" for learning an instrument but more about early intervention and proper training. I especially find myself shaking my head when I come across someone who listens to a musician and says "I could never play like that", because usually these are people who have never taken a music lesson! So how would they know? It's like listening to someone speak Japanese and saying "Wow, I could never speak that language." If you were born in Japan, raised there, and lived there into your early adolescence, you would end up speaking fluent Japanese, as skillfully as the others. That's because you would have learned Japanese when you were very, very young.
What does genetics have to do with it?
The "very, very young" part of my last sentence in the previous section is what I'm driving at. It also brings me to the point about a stereotype that many of us are familiar with, and that's the stereotype that many Asian children seem to be incredibly skilled with classical instruments, like the piano or the violin. And many of them are, indeed, but it's because these children were musically trained at an early age, sometimes as young as five. The reason why many Asians are so musically skilled is cultural, not genetic. There's no evidence, that I know of, that children of Asian descent have some kind of genetic inclination to be better musicians. It's popular in their culture to get kids started early and to give them very strict, disciplined training, so that when they're a little older they can wow audiences with musical skills that stun and perplex people. I'm convinced that if the same kind of early intervention and training was popular with American kids (or any other kids), and the kids actually stuck to it, the level of talent, abilities and success would be about the same as that of these Asian children.
Before going on to my next point, however, I need to mention something about my upbringing. My parents got me into violin lessons when I was seven. And I remember my violin teacher, very vividly. I think this vivid memory is because of the effect she had on me. She was strict, experienced, passionate, serious, and she really worked me hard. Believe me, I was just like any other 7-year-old kid you'd meet nowadays. I wasn't necessarily "exceptional" with some kind of magic fluid in my brain that made me musically inclined. Just like the other kids, my mind revolved around Star Wars action figures and helping my older brother put firecrackers into the dog poop of a neighbor's yard. You know, a kid. My mind wasn't always on learning the violin, either -- in fact, I remember a time when I asked my violin teacher if I could skip a day's lesson because I wanted to watch Woody Woodpecker on TV. Her answer was no. Why? Because violin lessons were, for lack of a better term, sacred. You didn't not go to a violin lesson. It just wasn't done. You went every week, whether you were motivated or not, whether you were tired or not -- it didn't matter. Lessons were lessons, and you didn't make exceptions. It was like going to school.
Excuses, excuses...
My memory of having to practice daily relates to a concept that seems down-right absent to a lot of people. My teacher made sure that I practiced every day. And when I say every day, I mean it was absolutely compulsory, in all senses of the word. Not just required, not just encouraged, not "recommended", not "If you can", not "Try to practice everyday when you have time", not "At your leisure" -- but absolutely compulsory. The attitude was not "Please practice every day, to ensure adequate progress." It was, simply, "You will practice once a day, every day, seven days a week, no exceptions." Since I was only seven, and new to the world, I assumed that my daily violin practice was as mandatory and as important as my homework. I didn't think about why, nor did I try to make sense of it -- I just assumed.
In order to get good, and I mean really good, this daily compulsory practice is a must. I tell my students this. And their parents. The interesting thing about this is that most of my students actually don't practice every day. The reason for this, as far as I can tell, is there is simply a different cultural attitude towards musical training than there is in other places. Piano lessons are often a last priority in a family, especially in a family where the kids have school, grandparents, family visits, soccer practice, Little League games, camping trips, school dances, karate classes, video games, Facebook, etc. etc. They probably end up saying, "I'll practice tomorrow... what's one day? He won't notice." This becomes a slippery slope where they say the exact same thing the next day because they've made themselves too busy. Before they know it they're "cramming" and trying to practice during the two hours before their lesson with me. And yes, I can tell. And yes, I call them on it :D The fascinating thing is that I also call their parents on it, and they're usually just as full of lame excuses as the kids are.
When I was a kid, this idea of just putting it off and skipping practice for a day hardly even occurred to me. It was so ingrained in my mind that the idea that I could skip a day's practice didn't even occur to me either. It would be like if your parents said, "Oh, don't worry about showering today", or "Don't worry about going to bed tonight." It was just done. It was a daily thing, no exceptions, like brushing your teeth before bed, or putting your PJ's on -- you did your homework, you cleaned your room, you set the table, you ate dinner with your family, you bickered with your brother, you watched cartoons for a little while, you did your homework, you practiced your violin, you brushed your teeth and you went to bed. That was that.
The absence of this understanding in the American culture is, I believe, one of the reasons why you don't always see a multitude of Beethovens and Mozarts shredding an instrument on the stage at those recitals, like you might in some other cultures. There are exceptions of course, but let me put it another way. And by another way, I mean all the fun analogies I can throw in. Not practicing is a lot like saying...
"Are you ready to run that marathon?"
"Oh, yes. I'm ready!"
"Did you practice running?"
"Oh, no... I just didn't have time."
"Are you ready to give that 20-minute speech to this big crowd?"
"Oh yes. I'm ready!"
"Did you practice giving the speech at home?"
"Oh no, I've just been really busy."
"Are you ready for that high-stakes basketball game against that rival team?"
"Yes! We're gonna beat 'em!"
"So did you practice playing basketball?"
"Oh, no, I just haven't had time. You know, too busy. I haven't dribbled a ball in like two weeks."
Get the idea? You're not going to learn an instrument if you don't play it all the time. That's just the way it is. An airline pilot has to actually practice flying the plane before getting his pilot's license. A magician has to perform his magic tricks in front of a mirror, day after day, over and over, before going on stage so he doesn't mess it up. I could go on and on.
Beethoven is not alone
The way this relates to the "Talent vs. Training" concept is that most of the people I come across who say, "It's just not in me," or, "I'm just not musically inclined" are the same people who decided to be lazy and not practice on a daily basis. It's not that you're not musically inclined, you just didn't practice. "I took piano lessons and it was just not for me, I didn't progress," is actually code for "I took piano lessons and didn't practice, so I didn't learn it." Also, you are now 50 years old, not 5. Older brains are harder to teach. The student I had who is in his 40's learned much more slowly than children do, and it was very difficult to teach him -- although he still did learn very well because he kept at it. My eight-year-old student, however, whose mind revolves around Disney movies, Barbie dolls, silly putty, glitter, and her favorite stuffed dragon (again, just like any other 8-year-old girl) can now replicate melodies that she hears for the first time, often on her first try. Young brains are like clay. You can mold them, train them, and eventually they just pick it up. The only challenge of teaching young kids is trying to keep the brats still for half an hour.
In light of this concept, here's what I think many people don't realize: when you're walking downtown through a crowd of people, you're actually gazing at hundreds of potential Mozarts and Beethovens. They just never became those Mozarts and Beethovens because they didn't take lessons when they were kids, or they did but they didn't stick to it, didn't practice, or because they did other things instead. And then they went to school, played football, got married, had kids., etc., etc. This "knack", or talent, that people have, this "gift" for playing incredible music, or this inclination to be slightly better-coordinated than others, etc., is only a small part of what makes a great musician. The other part, the larger part, I'm convinced, is the wonderful luck of their parents urging them to take music lessons at an early age and having a good teacher.
If it's a chore, you're not a musician
I want to add, though, that many musicians are self-taught. I was mostly self-taught on the piano, starting at around age eight (pictured below) with the exception of maybe six months of piano lessons as a teen, and this includes many rock musicians who were self-taught on instruments like the guitar or the drums.
Practicing everyday can be extremely valuable in the long run, even without formal musical training. Regardless of whether someone has had formal training, there's a sort of "test" that I think works to determine if someone is really a musician, and for me it's whether or not they have the desire to keep practicing as an adult. For me, the word "practice" bears a different meaning, and even a different connotation, than it does for many others. For me, that word doesn't imply in any way that it's a chore. When I sit at the piano and practice, I never dread it. Ever. It's the exact opposite -- it's more like, Yes! I have 20 minutes to spare. I can practice! And even when I don't have time to practice, I put other things off and practice anyway. It gets addicting, and I want to do it all the time. There's a bliss and a euphoric feeling in practicing that I think most musicians understand. I've played in bands where the other players have shared the same thoughts about this and have admitted that they, too, are the same way. Find a vocalist or a professional singer and follow her around for a day. You'll notice that she is constantly practicing, singing whenever she can, humming and la-la-la-ing -- in the elevator, in the car, while doing the laundry, between work meetings, etc. This is the result of having had enough training that you just want to keep doing it. The same is true for instrumentalists.
Practicing is so routine for me that it's hard to imagine going a long time without it. When I go on outings like a camping trip, or something that lasts more than a few days, I start feeling a sharp craving to play the piano, just because I haven't been able to get my hands on one for several days. Again, it should never be a chore that you have to "bring yourself to do." It should end up becoming something that you crave regularly. When your bladder is full because you have to pee, and you come home and instead run to your instrument because you want to jam on it, and you end up playing it for an hour before you actually pee, then you know you're a true musician. But to get to that point, where practicing actually becomes euphoric and addicting, you have to have initially practiced daily and consistently when you were first learning the fundamentals of the instrument. If you don't do this, you'll become one of those slackers full of excuses. You take a shower every day, which probably takes you about thirty minutes. If you have thirty minutes to take a shower, you have thirty minutes to practice.
Slackers pee and watch television before they practice their music -- and often they end up not practicing at all. Real musicians have to pee but they hold it in without realizing it because they're so eager to practice their instrument. Creative writing, actually, is very much the same way.
Come to think of it, I should stop here. I really have to pee.
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